March 2, 2011  by

Exploring Watercolor- All Ages

For our last week of the session, all of the classes started off learning about drawing and watercolor resists. The 1s and 2s classes used oil pastels as their drawing medium, which provide smooth deep pigments and work well in resisting the paint.
After taking a few moments to draw, the children were anxious to work with the liquid watercolors. I’ve learned by now that using a tray is a must when offering any kind of liquid to toddlers!
For the 1s class, I use jars for the liquid watercolor rather than the paint cup base that the older kids use. The 1 yr olds love to practice their pouring skills by transferring the watercolors back and forth between the jars… a skill that I like to encourage!




The children experimented with eye-droppers, coffee filters, and a few other tools they found on the shelf.
The 3s/4s class began with a still life drawing of a rose. I offered them black Sharpie markers (explaining that they are important “grown-up markers”) to carefully draw the lines and shapes of the rose. Most of the kids just drew whatever they pleased- grasping the concept of a still life will take a little more practice! After the drawing session, I brought out the liquid watercolors to add to their work.



Glitter became a key medium in this project!
After working with watercolors, the 1s and 2s classes got to experience the joys of foam painting! Foam paint is like shaving cream, without the toxic smells. I squirted some onto each tray and the kids enjoyed the sensory experience of lathering it over their hands and arms.
Then they added paint to the foam to create swirls of color.

The trays soon became a station for messy sensory discovery. The children used all kinds of tools and added water and glitter to the mix.


For the 1s classes I offered an extra layer of sensory by squirting the foam onto bubble wrap.




The mixture of water, foam, paint, and bubble wrap was delightful!
The 3s and 4s class moved on from their watercolor resists, to a different kind of watercolor collage. First they used a sponge and water to wet their paper. Then they placed small pieces of “bleeding tissue paper” into a collage design (when wet, the tissue paper releases it’s color). If needed, they used the sponges to moisten the tissue paper as well. When the tissue paper dries, it will fall off and leave a colorful design in it’s place!

Outside the 2s and 3s/4s classes worked on their spray bottle skills, spraying liquid watercolor onto a cloth and bulls eye paper.
The bulls eye spray game was something we tried out last summer. The kids love to aim and shoot!

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February 2, 2011  by

Drawing and Watercolor Resists

For the last week of this mini- session, we explored drawing and watercolor painting. The 2s classes began with a still life of an aloe plant. I wanted to introduce the children to the concept of drawing an object that they can see in front of them, but I also wanted to find something that was fairly simple in form. I chose the aloe plant because it is made up of mostly simple lines. I encouraged the children to touch the plant and look at the shape/lines of the plant before drawing.
Then I offered the children black Sharpie markers (calling them “special grown-up markers”) to try to draw the aloe plant. I’m not sure if any of the children really understood the concept of drawing the plant (some of the children thought I meant to draw on the plant) , but it was still a fun exercise to get them used to the idea.
For the 1s class, I offered the children oil pastels and encouraged them to make marks on the paper.

After our drawing sessions, I brought out a tray and liquid watercolor paints for each child. The oil pastels and sharpie markers will show through the watercolor to create a “resist” painting.


After a little while of painting with brushes, I brought out eye-droppers to use with the watercolors. They take a little practice before mastering, but once the children figured them out they proved to be very interesting!




To further the exploration of watercolor, I offered the children “bleeding” tissue paper and cups of water to make their own watercolor. When the tissue paper gets wet, it bleeds the color into the water- then the wad of tissue can be used to paint with!


Of course all the children eventually wanted more water, so I gave them their own squeeze bottles- this incited the investigation of mixing colorful water with a variety of materials: glitter, glue, mixing tools, cars, necklaces, etc.



It was really interesting to see how the colors in the water reacted to movement and different materials.



When the children asked for more water, I gave them sponges and showed them how to re-use their water by soaking it up and squeezing it back into a cup or bottle.

The Wednesday class asked to use the spray bottles like the previous week when they “washed” the chair seats.
Soon enough, they were washing the chairs again!
The children also worked at the easels with oil pastels and watercolors.



Towards the end of class, we continued our exploration of watercolor outside. For the 1s class, we spread bleeding tissue paper over white watercolor paper. The children squeezed water onto the tissue paper to see the colors bleed onto the white background.

The 2s classes used spray bottles filled with liquid watercolor to paint the white canvas… among other things!


The batiks are finally dry! Here’s one of the finished pieces.

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December 3, 2010  by

Beading and Open Studio

For the final week of the fall session, we focused on beaded sculptures and jewelry. For each child, I pre-made a base for the sculpture using a wood block, nails, and plastic coated wire. Then I offered the children beads for stringing onto the wire. For the older children, I also offered them elastic beading cord for making jewelry.Instead of planning a second project for when the kids got sick of beading, I wanted to offer them an “open studio,” with most of our materials accessible to them on the shelf. I began the fall session with only tools on the shelf (and paint at the easels) then eventually placed the glitter on the lower shelves as well. Now that the children have had weeks of experience with the materials, It is time to give them a greater sense of autonomy in their creative process. On the lower shelves I placed glitter, markers, oil pastels, tempera paint, liquid watercolor, colored glue, collage items, paper, and a variety of tools (the rollers, brushes, and eyedroppers were new additions). I was curious to see how the children would respond to the variety of choices and accessibility.
In the first few classes, the children came into the studio and immediately began beading, without noticing the new shelf set-up. Their focus and fine motor skills were incredible!

Luke and Brooks checked out materials on the floor while the big kids worked on beading… too cute to not include!




When the children finished beading their wires, I helped them to twist the wire around the other nail head and… voila! A wire sculpture that you can bend and shape again and again.
While some kids took to beading right away, others spotted the new set-up and went straight for the shelves!
The children were encouraged to use the materials on the shelves, even if that meant gluing all over their bead work or passing up the beads all together.


I think it is important for children to learn at an early age how to be self-starters and creative thinkers. In my experience it seems that young children naturally start out this way, but aren’t always allowed the opportunity to strengthen these skills. This is something that I work on with the children throughout each session. I was delighted to see on this last week that without planning and prompting from me, most of the kids knew exactly what they wanted to do and how to do it.
The rest of the photos will give you a glimpse of the “open studio” work of the children.




















Thanks for a wonderful session and Happy Holidays!

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November 16, 2010  by

New Clay Provocation and Watercolor

For our second clay exploration of the session, I decided to present the clay in the form of balls and coils, rather than a slab. The addition of toothpicks and popsicle sticks offers a provocation for a new way of working with the clay (Reggio Emilia early childhood experts use the term “provocation” as a form of provoking, or inviting, children to interact with a material or idea). I set up a workspace for myself as well so I could model different ways to use the materials. I wanted to present the clay in a way that would encourage the kids to build up, rather than out. The toothpicks proved to be great tool to connect the pieces together to create a sturdy structure. The children also loved sticking them into the clay to create spikes.


After our initial exploration with the toothpicks, I began to bring out more tools, water, and extra slabs of clay for the kids to work with.


Sienna celebrated her 2nd birthday with us in class! Happy birthday Sienna!






The kids began to move around the studio and found the easels set up with oil pastels and liquid watercolor paints.



Some of the kids decided to bring the watercolors to the table to use with their clay. As the table began to overflow with watercolor, I brought out coffee filters to soak up some of the liquid, creating interesting effects.
To continue the watercolor theme, I offered each child a large piece of watercolor paper with various stencils and cookie cutters to place on the paper (everyone started with a stencil of the first letter of their name). Then the children sprayed their papers with liquid watercolor and left the papers on the floor to dry.



When they were dry, I removed the stencils to reveal white images of the shapes on the paper!

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November 14, 2010  by

Colored Glue Collage and Sand!

This week in the 1s class we worked on colored glue collages. Electra and Aly worked hard trying to squeeze the glue out of the bottle- which is great for fine motor development! I also offered them a tray of small collage materials like foam shapes, beads, and jewels.The children first experimented with swirling the glue around their paper and mixing the colors, then began to chose items from the tray to stick into their glue.
After a little while, I brought out bowls of colored sand to the table. The kids scooped the sand onto their glue and rubbed it around with their hands, feeling the grainy sand mix with the sticky glue.
Because young toddlers love to scoop, I always keep a large bin of collage materials like dried pasta and beans to use with glue. The kids use small cups to scoop out the materials and dump them onto their paper.
Aly moved around the studio and was excited to use the markers set out on the easels.
Electra was happy to stay at her seat and explore all the interesting items that she collected onto her paper.

Towards the end of class, we brought some materials outside to try out the splat paintings that we did in the older classes. The girls enjoyed squeezing the water onto the plate of paint and pom-poms and then throwing the pom-poms at the easel!I then set up the tray on top of the water table and brought out the colored sand, colored water, plate of paint, and other fun mixing tools… so much fun!




See you next time!

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October 12, 2010  by

Oil Pastel Drawings and Making Our Own Paint

As leaves and petals begin to fall this time of year, I realized that they would make great materials for this week’s art exploration… making our own natural paint! We began first with oil pastels and water color paper to create a base for our plant paintings. The oil pastels will resist (and show through) the paint to create a multimedia work of art.
For the older class, I placed jars of flowers on the table and invited them to draw a still life of a flower. I asked them to pick one or all of the flowers to look at, focusing on the shapes, lines, and colors. Although some representations were more abstract than others, all the children worked hard at observing the flowers.



Once the kids had some time to draw, I brought out the materials to make our own plant paint. Each child was given a bowl, spoon, and a bottle of water. Then they chose flower petals and leaves to crush with water in their bowl.
To crush the plants well, it’s best to use a mortar and pestle, which the children took turns using.
In other classes, I used a blender to crush some red rose petals to get a stronger color.

After the initial experience of making our own paint, I offered watercolors to the children which was a little more interesting than painting with very diluted flower colors.


Eventually the children wanted to add glitter and jewels to their bowls, making a sparkling potion-type of paint!









Around the studio, the children found some interesting materials to work with!



A bowl of sparkly flower paint!

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August 9, 2010  by

Re-visiting old work and Monoprinting

Although our focus this week was on monoprinting, we began class working on unfinished projects from previous weeks. The children were first invited to use markers to add to their watercolor paintings from last week.




Another project to be continued was their salt dough sculptures that were finally dry and ready to be painted.

After re-visiting the old work, the kids were ready to get going on some monoprinting! We worked on two different types of monoprints, depending on the class. One type was done by paining directly on a plastic mat, placing a sheet of paper onto the painting, gently rubbing the back of the paper, and then peeling it up. Most of the kids have tried this technique on the acrylic easel, but it was a new experience to do it right on the table.



My niece, Naomi, demonstrated the printmaking for the kids. She may become my new assistant!
The second monoprint technique is a fun and very easy project to try at home. First I folded a large piece of paper (for each child) in half. They painted on one side of the paper, then unfolded it and refolded it the other way, so that their painting created a mirror image on the other half.
Eventually the glue, glitter, and all kinds of things came out- and the children led the way from there!








The children are getting more interested in using the scissors lately- what a hard skill to learn!


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July 5, 2010  by

Leaf Prints in Clay

I wasn’t planning on doing clay this week, but of course being open to an emergent curriculum means tossing my plan out the window if necessary. Last week I had many requests for working with clay again and I wanted to honor those requests and let the kids continue to explore clay in different ways. This time I offered them a red firing clay (as opposed to the white modeling clay), which is much softer and a little grainy. I first gave them some time to get to know this clay with familiar tools.



After a bit of exploration, I brought out a variety of leaves and demonstrated how to make a leaf print (explaining that it is similar to making a print with paper and paint- which they are experts in!)





The leaf printing was very exciting for about 5 minutes! Then the kids began to gather paint, glue and other materials to use with their clay.




Eventually, the easels were visited as the kids moved around the studio.




Some of the kids brought scissors to their clay work and learned how to cut the clay!

After working with the clay, the older class decided to work with markers on the floor. When some of them began to draw faces, I offered them hand mirrors to see the details of their own faces like we did with our self-portraits.


Sometimes when we wash up outside, the kids request the spray bottles…

Some of the finished clay work

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June 22, 2010  by

Watercolor Fun!

This week the older class started off making suncatchers. They were very interested in peeling off the tissue paper after gluing it down and seemed focused on the sensory aspect of their artwork over the design- which is probably why they requested clay again for the next class! After suncatchers they moved on to watercolor painting with various brushes and tools.





This week the toddler classes worked on watercolor and oil pastel resists. They began by first drawing with oil pastels on the watercolor paper.



After a while I brought out the liquid watercolor paints for them to add to their drawings. Soon, the children were bringing various tools and materials to the table to use with the paint. The new foam shapes and glue were a big hit!
Kirsten takes a snack break as she watches Austin experiment with a necklace.



On the easels, the children painted over a large paper decorated with foam stickers. Once the paintings are dry, we will peel off the stickers to see what’s underneath!



Towards the end of class we brought the watercolor spray bottles outside for a different style of painting.

See you next week!

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May 3, 2010  by

New Painting Projects

Mother’s day is coming up so we began class this week with a spring themed gift-making project for all the moms. If you weren’t in class… don’t look! It’s a surprise!The first step of the project is painting a clay pot (which I got from the local garden store). When they dry, I’ll coat them with a sealer and then they’ll be ready for planting our flowers.


In the toddler classes, the children painted their pot little by little, as they looked for other objects to paint. I decided to bring out the next activity (potato prints!) to work on simultaneously. To prepare the potatoes, I cut each one in half and carved a simple shape into the top to create a stamp. An easy way to do this is to use a metal cookie cutter to push down on the potato. This cuts the shape for you, then all you have to do is carve out around the cut. As the children get older, they can learn to do this step themselves.
Along with their paper, I gave each child a plate of paint to use with the potato stamps.
The fun part is pounding the potato onto the paper to create colorful shapes (and the potato is the perfect chunky size for their little hands).

This week I also introduced marble painting to the children. I offered each child a tray with paper inside, a cup of paint and marbles, and a spoon for scooping the marbles. They put painted marbles into their trays and shook them around to create a new kind of painting.
Some of the finished paintings…
The toddlers are still too young to be working with marbles (many of them try to eat our materials) so I gave each child a golf ball to use in the same way.


After experimenting with the new activities, the kids began to move around the studio to find more familiar materials.



A sweet moment of sharing!
Our third activity for the older children was to continue working on the spray mural that they made a few weeks ago. I taped it down to the floor and set out markers for them to use. Jordan and Anna first began drawing clouds and rain. It had been a strange day of off and on rain and sun. Here is a bit of thier conversation as they drew:
Anna: “Where do the clouds come from?”
Jordan: “I think they come for the rain.”
Anna: “I think the sun is stronger than the rain.”
Jordan: “I think the wind is stronger.”
When Jason and Jessica joined them, they began drawing bridges. Jordan first drew the bridge she crosses to get to school, then Anna drew the Golden Gate Bridge. Then Jason said: “This is the Bay Bridge because it’s so long.”


With the new warm weather, the children began to ask to go outside earlier than usual.
I brought some activities outside for them to work on as we wrapped up class.
Rock painting…
Mural spraying…
But the water play is always the most fun!
Even siblings get in on the action at pick-up time!

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